


"The Adventures of the Hooded Heroine"

by CelesteFitzgerald



Series: Katie's 12 Days of Christmas [7]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Christmas, Fluff, Gen, Pre-Canon, cute sisters being cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-26
Updated: 2018-12-26
Packaged: 2019-09-27 17:20:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17166092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CelesteFitzgerald/pseuds/CelesteFitzgerald
Summary: Ruby's too excited to sleep on Christmas Eve, so she goes downstairs early to try to sneak some presents. Unfortunately, Yang catches her. But Ruby's persistence convinces Yang to let her open one present early - a very special present.





	"The Adventures of the Hooded Heroine"

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SevenCandlesticks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SevenCandlesticks/gifts).



> Takes place several years before Volume 1, when Ruby and Yang are both children.

_Creak._

Yang groaned at the noise as she rolled over to try to fall back asleep, but in the brief second that her eyes were open she noticed that the bedroom door was ajar. On further inspection, she realized that Ruby’s bed was empty.

Sighing, she climbed out of bed to find her sister. She glanced at the clock before she left the room. _4:32._ What was Ruby doing up so early on—

She gasped. _Christmas. It’s Christmas!_ Yang should have known Ruby would have trouble sleeping that night. She always had trouble sleeping when she was excited….She was probably going downstairs to open her presents early again, wasn’t she? Yang picked up the pace and hopped down the last three steps to look for Ruby in the living room.

Sure enough, there she was, standing by the tree and bouncing impatiently. Her patience would certainly run out during the next few minutes if Yang didn’t do anything to stop her.

“Dad’s not gonna be happy,” Yang whispered.

Before Yang had even finished her sentence, Ruby let out a startled squeak and spun around to face her sister—then clasped her hands over her mouth, hoping that their dad hadn’t already woken up. “Yang,” she muttered from between her fingertips, “what’re you doing here?”

“You’re not as sneaky as you think you are, sis,” Yang said as she approached Ruby and poked her in the side.

“I’m super sneaky,” she pouted before turning back to the presents and taking a step toward them.

“Ruby…” Yang warned. There was no way Ruby would get away with this on her watch.

Ruby let out a whimper and plopped onto the floor with her arms crossed. “Waiting is stupid. It’s already after midnight, can’t we start Christmas now?”

As much as Yang wanted to agree with her, she had to be the responsible one. “No. We’re supposed to wait ‘til Dad wakes up.”

“Why?” Ruby said, dragging out the end of the word as she leaned backward to lie completely down. “He sleeps forever.”

Yang lightly stepped on Ruby’s stomach with one foot, wiggling her toes until Ruby giggled and sat back up. “He does _not_ , he’ll be up in three hours.”

“Too long,” Ruby said.

This kid just wouldn’t quit, would she? Yang wasn’t sure if she could win this fight—especially with Ruby giving her those big, puppy-dog eyes. “…One present.”

Ruby’s face brightened, and she jumped up to throw her arms around Yang. “Thank you thank you thank you!”

“Shh, you won’t get to open _any_ presents if Dad hears us down here.” After Ruby promised to be quiet, Yang walked over to the tree and sifted through the stack of presents. “Here,” she said as she pulled out a small, flat one. “This one’s from me.”

Ruby grabbed the gift and bounced over to the couch, already tearing the paper a bit before she got there. She ripped off the rest of the wrapping paper and looked at the thin stack of paper, bound together by a few strands of yarn. “A book?”

Yang beamed. “I wrote it myself! I even did all the art, too,” she said, pointing at the front cover.

Her eyes widening, Ruby started to squeal again—until Yang put a hand over her mouth. Once she had (slightly) calmed down and Yang had removed her hand, Ruby held the book out to Yang. “Can you read it to me?”

“Sure,” she said, taking the book and holding it between them. Ruby snuggled up against her shoulder, and Yang smiled.

Now that they were ready to begin, Yang cleared her throat for dramatic effect. “ _The Adventures of the Hooded Heroine, by the brilliant up-and-coming author Yang Xiao Long_.”

Ruby flicked Yang’s head. “Read it right.”

“Hey, don’t get mad at me, that’s just what the book says,” Yang winked. She turned the first page and continued.

“ _Once upon a time, there was a brave little girl named Ruby. She lived deep in the forest and was always wearing her favorite red hood. She dreamed of being a hero, but how could a tiny little kid like her ever save the world all by herself?_ ”

As she turned to the next pace, Yang glanced over at Ruby. She was absolutely enthralled, staring wide-eyed at Yang’s amateur drawings like they were the best artwork she’d ever seen.

“ _Then one day, she had to go to town to buy some cookies. But when she got there, there was a big, scary Grimm!_ ”

Ruby gasped from beside her, and Yang felt a small hand tighten around her arm.

“ _Everyone in the town was running and screaming, but Ruby stayed still. Then the Grimm saw her and started coming straight towards her! Ruby tried not to move, but she accidentally backed up into a cart with jars of Dust, and one of the jars fell over on top of a spider._ ”

“Eww, spider,” Ruby whined, apparently more concerned about the spider than the Grimm that was about to attack her character.

“ _The spider started to glow with Dust power, and it was so confused that it ran over to Ruby and bit her leg! ‘Ow!’ said Ruby. But then she felt something. The spider bite had given her the magic Dust power too!_ ”

The real-life Ruby gasped again.

“ _She started to glow, and when the glowing stopped, she noticed that her whole outfit had been upgraded! Now she was a real superhero! With her extra-long cloak waving in the wind, she walked toward the Grimm. ‘Hey you,’ she said, ‘stay away from these poor, innocent civilians.’ But the Grimm wasn’t backing down! It took another step toward her, and she knew she had to use her new weapon. She reached for her belt and grabbed her gun—_ ”

“Scythe.”

“Huh?”

“She should have a scythe.”

“Relax, I wasn’t done with the sentence yet,” Yang said. “ _She reached for her belt and grabbed her_ …um…gun-that-also-turns-into-a-scythe…” Yang looked toward Ruby for approval. She seemed more than satisfied with this version. “… _and she aimed it at the Grimm. ‘Okay, you left me no choice,’ she said as she fired the gu—_ er, swung the scythe— _at the Grimm. It went down after one hit! Ruby was a hero!_

“ _The townspeople started to come out of hiding, and they all crowded around Ruby. ‘Thank you for saving us, Miss Superhero,’ they all said. ‘You’re welcome,’ said Ruby. ‘What’s your name?’ one of them asked. ‘My name? My name is…the Hooded Heroine!’_

“ _The townspeople thanked her again, and she went back to her house. She yawned. Fighting that Grimm was a lot of work. She put on her pajamas and went to bed. But when she woke up…she heard screaming from the town! She grabbed her hood and her weapon. ‘Here we go again!’_

“ _The end._ ”

Yang closed the book and handed it back to Ruby. “So? What’d you think?”

Ruby looked at Yang, her eyes and smile gradually getting wider as a tiny squeal escaped her mouth. “That was amazing! You really did that all by yourself?”

“Yup!” Yang said, overjoyed that Ruby liked it.

“You’re the best big sister ever—oh, wait—she never bought the cookies that she went into town for,” Ruby said.

Oh yeah. Whoops. “Umm, now that she’s a superhero she doesn’t have time for cookies.”

Yang had never seen the smile fall from Ruby’s face so fast. “No…no cookies? Ever?”

Uh-oh. “Hah, gotcha sis! Just kidding! There’s always time for cookies. The cookies were just…destroyed by the Grimm.” Nice save.

“Dumb Grimm, ruining all the cookies,” Ruby grumbled. Then she let out a yawn.

“Aw, is someone finally tired?” Yang said, wrapping an arm around her sister.

“No,” Ruby insisted, but her heavy eyelids betrayed her lie.

“We should go back to bed until Dad wakes up.” Yang grabbed Ruby’s hand to pull her from the couch, and Ruby didn’t put up much resistance.

“Fine,” Ruby said as they walked back up the stairs and toward their bedroom, the book still clutched in her hand. “Yang?” She asked as she got back into bed.

“Yeah?”

“…Can you read it to me one more time? To help me sleep?”

Smiling, Yang climbed into Ruby’s bed and huddled next to her under the covers. “Of course.”

Five hours later, their dad found them there in Ruby’s bed, still fast asleep. “Merry Christmas, girls,” he whispered. He shut the door and let them rest.

**Author's Note:**

> A gift for my friend Katie. Merry Christmas <3


End file.
